Posts Tagged ‘art’
Who needs a car in L.A.? We got the best public transportation system in the world!
May 2, 2013
“Who needs a car in L.A.? We got the best public transportation system in the world!” says private detective Eddie Valiant in the 1988 film Who Framed Roger Rabbit? Matt Novak of the Smithsonian Magazine Blog Paleo Future writes about the rise and dominance of the car in Los Angeles. It is a fascinating read [...]
2013 | From the Road, Inspiration | Tags: adventures, art, environment, happiness, Inspiration, ModernismComments (0)
A Striking Visual History of New York City
April 30, 2013
I came across an article by the Associated Press announcing the release of an amazing photo database of 870,000 photos of New York City from the mid 1800’s through the late 20th century. No one, two or twenty photographers could ever shoot a collection as vast and varied as this, but anonymous municipal workers did, [...]
2013 | Architecture, Events, From the Road, Industrial Design | Tags: adventures, Architecture, art, environment, museum, researchComments (0)
Hot Location, Cool Hotel.
March 25, 2013
It’s not a Kimpton, but we’d stay at the The Saguaro Hotel in Palm Springs. These folks are not afraid of color, and the space seems to celebrate the desert, and Palm Springs Modernism. The Saguaro interior and exterior are a riot of bold color that pays homage to the swinging midcentury vibe of this desert [...]
2013 | Architecture, From the Road | Tags: art, color, design, environment, Inspiration, Lighting Design, Modernism, set designComments (0)
The Tragic Beauty of Abandoned Urban Landscapes
January 18, 2013
Sander Meisner, a photographer who lives in Amsterdam brilliantly captures the interplay of light, shadow and color, breathing life into the often overlooked tragic beauty of abandoned, decaying urban industrial landscapes. Tweet
2013 | Architecture, Industrial Design, Inspiration | Tags: adventures, Architecture, art, color, design, environment, lightingComments (0)
aaah, New Year’s Eve…
December 31, 2012
of course, there should be some sparkle in every evening. May 2013 sparkle and shine for everyone. Tweet
2012 | Art for Art's Sake, Fashion, The Work | Tags: art, design, KLAD, lighting, Lighting Design, scenic design, set designComments (0)
Scare away the demons…
December 25, 2012
Not sure where or when we heard this legend, but it’s a good one, so we indulge. We do like to indulge. It is said that there should be a devil on every tree, to scare away the demons and welcome the good. This is ours. Tweet
2012 | Art for Art's Sake, The Work | Tags: art, design, happiness, Happy Hour, KLAD, Lighting Design, set designComments (0)
Fading Memories of a Bygone Era
November 14, 2012
If you’ve spent time in New York, or almost any old industrial city, you’ve probably seen some ghost signs. Glimpses of the past, when women wore corsets, blacksmiths welded carriages, and Coca Cola was sold everywhere for 5 cents ( there’s no cent symbol on my keyboard, another relic of the past, I guess). These signs [...]
2012 | Architecture, From the Road, Industrial Design, Uncategorized | Tags: adventures, Architecture, art, design, environment, InspirationComments (1)
Does Design Have To Work?
June 8, 2012
“Designers are artists of real issues. We are not creating art by any means, art is a selfish act and design is a social act.” -unknown. I’ve been contemplating this quote for quite a while. When I first read it, I was a bit put off. I make my living by design, and there’s always [...]
2012 | Architecture, Design Basics, Industrial Design, set design critique | Tags: adventures, Architecture, art, design, designer, environmentComments (0)
Sneaky, Kinda Brilliant Moonshine Runners
May 16, 2012
From Boing Boing – my favorite culture surfing site, an interesting slice of Americana. And Shoes The May 27, 1922 issue of The Evening Independent carried a story about moonshiners wearing “cow shoes” to trick revenuers — rather than leaving suspicious footprints leading up to their secret stills, they’d leave innocent-looking hoofprints in the dirt and grass. [...]
2012 | Industrial Design, Inspiration | Tags: adventures, art, design, Inspiration, researchComments (0)
Light Dancing – Natural Light Plays on Modern
May 10, 2012
Here at KLAD we often use specific lighting instruments, gobos, and gels to design lighting for our set design projects. Here, a series of cantilevers and recesses create a rhythm for nature’s lights to show off pattern shadows on a modern home designed by architect David Jameson. The series of cubes, with frameless windows and edges of the flat roof that [...]
2012 | Architecture, Inspiration | Tags: Architecture, art, design, elegant, environment, lighting, Lighting Design, ModernismComments (1)
Jens Risom celebrating nearly a century of iconic design
May 8, 2012
“Comfort vs. function in furniture can be quickly resolved. A well designed sofa settles the question in one sitting” – Jens Risom
2012 | Industrial Design, Inspiration | Tags: art, color, design, designer, Inspiration, Modernism, museumComments (0)
Pantone Chocolate Please
May 6, 2012
It has been way too long since I’ve indulged in my love of food and drink here on the blog. We’ve been so busy here in the KLAD studio that I haven’t had time to cook, bake or mix up classic cocktails in forever. I do find minutes here and there to read food blogs, [...]
2012 | Gastronauting, Happy Hour, Inspiration | Tags: adventures, art, color, colour, design, designer, InspirationComments (0)
Times Square at Night 1957
March 30, 2012
As usual, Kirsten Hively, of Project Neon fame, posts a link to feed my signage fetish. This silent 16mm home movie footage of Times Square at Night was shot in 1957. JohnMeyer77 posted this on his You Tube channel. From his description: I used motion stabilization software to remove the shake from the hand-held footage. This [...]
2012 | Architecture, Film, Inspiration | Tags: adventures, Architecture, art, color, design, Inspiration, neon, signsComments (1)
Vectorworks Creative Minds Monthly Design Competition
March 28, 2012
Nemetschek Vectorworks has announced their Creative Minds competition that challenges designers, including and especially set designers and lighting designers, to explore multiple options for documenting and presenting your response to a design concept. Each month’s concept can be answered with ANY kind of design response – architectural design, product design, landscape design, entertainment design, or [...]
2012 | Architecture, Theatre of Games, VectorWorks, VWX Spotlight and Design | Tags: Architecture, art, design, environment, green, KLAD, lighting, Modernism, scenic design, set design, VectorWorksComments (0)
Art Director’s Notebook: Playful Lighting
February 17, 2012
They are all over ebay, at flea markets and garage sales – toys! Sometimes dented, chipped, die cast metal cars missing wheels or windshields, robots that no longer wind up, action figures that lost a scuffle or two. What happens to these cast aside remnants of childhood? Do they somehow make their way to the [...]
2012 | Inspiration | Tags: art, design, green, Inspiration, lighting, redComments (0)
Set Designer’s Notebook: Heavenly Stairways
February 13, 2012
Thanks to the amazing people at Design Milk, I’ve found a treasure trove of set design inspiration in a single post. Behold the soaring wonderfulness of staircases, they say and do so many things. Of course, they get us from one level of a structure to another, and that is important. When we put our [...]
2012 | Industrial Design, Inspiration, The Work | Tags: adventures, Architecture, art, design, Inspiration, KLAD, Modernism, scenic design, set designComments (0)
Someone said the ceiling should be white?
January 18, 2012
I like the Houzz site, but all too often it seems to exist to sell the obvious to the oblivious. Apparently, it is a revelation that ceilings do not have to be painted white. I suppose this would be Set Design 101, but maybe the idea isn’t covered during Interior Design school? According to the [...]
2012 | Architecture, Inspiration, Restaurant Design | Tags: Architecture, art, design, Film, film design, production design, scenic design, set design, TheatreComments (0)
We’re not for burning books, but this…
December 27, 2011
Turning the written, and well, then printed, word into sculpture. This takes the idea and art of the set design model into new territory. Artist Guy Laramee has carved a series of hardcover Chinese and English encyclopedias into stunning landscapes for two series entitled The Great Wall and Biblios. His metaphor is scary and a bit [...]
2011 | Art for Art's Sake, Inspiration | Tags: Architecture, art, design, set designComments (0)
Another sculpture/award by Set Designers for NYMF
December 6, 2011
A couple dancing on a film reel stage in front of an elegant grand drape. These are the things set designers make out of clear Plexiglas and mirror when creating awards to be presented to Neil Meron and Craig Zadan of Storyline Entertainment by NYMF. Neil and Craig produce on Broadway, but they are especially known [...]
2011 | Industrial Design, Theatre, VectorWorks | Tags: Architecture, art, design, scenic design, set design, Theatre, VectorWorksComments (0)
Set Designer’s Notebook: UnBeige
November 29, 2011
Client: I like it, but um, I think it needs to be more neutral. What do you think? Me: I wouldn’t show you something I didn’t like, and I really think this color palette enhances the product shot. Client: Its too much. Its distracting. Make it all white. And so it goes sometimes in the [...]
2011 | Art for Art's Sake, Design Basics, Inspiration | Tags: art, color, colour, design, Graphic Design, Modernism, Path: p » a » img.aligncenter size-full wp-image-2799 Word count: 187 Draft saved at 1:49:55 pm., researchComments (1)
Like a Set Design Model, but Sculpture…
November 23, 2011
Artist Peter Root has created a sculpture Ephemicropolis using only staples to build a terrain that evokes a cityscape. Clearly he has and uses the same skills a set designer uses to build models, miniatures or Marquettes of stage designs. Could easily mock this up in Vectorworks. 10,000 staples, wow. And 40 hours seems a [...]
2011 | Inspiration, Theatre, VectorWorks, VWX Spotlight and Design | Tags: Architecture, art, design, set design, VectorWorksComments (0)
Why can’t News Stands be art?
November 11, 2011
The street side news stands offer many possible choices for a film set designer or production designer. Fewer choices for the news stand operators. In what often seems as an all too zealous effort to ‘clean up’ NYC or fix what isn’t broken, iconic news stands are being replaced with homogenized glass and steel structures [...]
2011 | Architecture, Industrial Design, Inspiration | Tags: Architecture, art, design, Film, set designComments (1)
Like the High Line, but Italian
November 2, 2011
It is a living set design and a backdrop for romance. Of course, some of the architect’s in charge of the project also have theatrical backgrounds. A new recreational promenade was opened this past summer, created out of a section of retired railway in between the towns of Albisola Superiore and Celle Ligure on the [...]
2011 | Architecture, Inspiration | Tags: adventures, Architecture, art, design, Modernism, VectorWorksComments (0)
KLAD Moment of Zen
September 25, 2011
Charging through the Saturday crowds in Chinatown and Soho, to pick up supplies at Pearl Paint while waiting for an order to be cut at Canal Plastics, I’m reminded yet again why there’s no place else I’d rather be. I didn’t bring my camera, but since I am on my phone constantly, I snapped this tiny [...]
2011 | Architecture, Art for Art's Sake, From the Road, Humor, Inspiration | Tags: adventures, Architecture, art, color, design, Inspiration, paint, researchComments (3)
Flying into the Future through a Golden Age Doorway
September 12, 2011
As a newly minted salesperson, I flew the Pan Am shuttle to Boston a million times. Ticket book in hand, I’d run through the terminal getting to the gate just in time to jump on the plane. Focused on my client meetings, and trying not to draw the ire of my relentless sales manager, I [...]
2011 | Architecture, From the Road, Industrial Design | Tags: adventures, Architecture, art, design, elegant, environment, Inspiration, researchComments (0)
Set Designers Should Be Preservationists
September 1, 2011
There, I said it. Flame away haters of building huggers, I have an asbestos suit that I throw on when I get riled up and write about Historic Preservation. Why should set designers, or most designers be preservationists? An important reason is that we rely on a combination of many different tools and techniques to [...]
2011 | Architecture, Inspiration | Tags: Architecture, art, design, environment, Inspiration, Modernism, preservation, research, set designComments (0)
Set Design Notebook: Hues, Tones, & Textures
June 30, 2011
A contemporary wall treatment created by artfully combining a furniture maker’s wood scraps. By Anne-Sophie Poirier for the Slowpoke Cafe, Melbourne Australia. I think this wall treatment would work beautifully in a day spa or a as a fireplace wall. More photos of this wall and other elements of the cafe at Dezeen Tweet
2011 | Architecture, Design Basics, Industrial Design, Inspiration, Restaurant Design | Tags: Architecture, art, design, green, Inspiration, ModernismComments (0)
Of course subway stations are cool…
May 28, 2011
…and not just as set designs for James Bond movies. This one, at left could be the Gates of Hell. Or the entry to one of the Bond villain’s lairs. Or the Stockholm subway. More than makes braving the cold worth the trip, I would think. The New York City Subway is terrific, but it [...]
2011 | Architecture, Inspiration | Tags: Architecture, art, Film, film design, set design, Television, Theatre, TV, VectorWorksComments (0)
Dog Portraits
May 9, 2011
Those of you who are familiar from my fine art work may think that I’ve strayed (get it, yuk, yuk, yuk) from my normal subject matter. But, a pretty girl is a pretty girl, no matter her species. Of course, I’ve also painted male dogs. We were recently commissioned to paint portraits of Bella and [...]
2011 | Art for Art's Sake, The Work | Tags: art, color, colour, designComments (0)
Set Design Research – Miami to Mexico to the Jersey Shore
April 19, 2011
Always on the lookout for set design inspiration and not being impressed with Spring so far, I’ve been poking around the internet hoping to find a ray of sustained sunshine to brighten things up a bit. We’re designing sets for a client who wants to see shapes and colors that evoke a Miami tropical vibe, [...]
2011 | Architecture, Inspiration, The Work | Tags: Architecture, art, color, design, elegant, environment, Inspiration, Modernism, research, set designComments (0)
First The Set Designers Came For The Carps…
March 11, 2011
Now our intrepid set designers have their sights on the scenic painters. In our last edition of Designers Know Best, we took you on a little tour of the shop and highlighted some of the early work of the carpenters. Obviously, they were thrilled with us during our visit and greeted us enthusiastically today upon [...]
2011 | From the Road, Humor, Television, The Studio, The Work, Uncategorized | Tags: adventures, art, color, design, designer, happiness, KLAD, paint, scenic design, set design, sets, Television, TVComments (1)
Set Design Inspiration: Modernism Week
February 22, 2011
It’s Modernism Week in Palm Springs, CA! If, like us hard working set designers here at KLAD, you couldn’t get out to CA this year, I’ve added some links to Modernism Week, and the spectacular Dinah Shore house designed by the super talented Modernist Architect, Donald Wexler. I’ll be posting nuggets of information as I [...]
2011 | Architecture, Events, Inspiration | Tags: Architecture, art, design, designer, elegant, environment, Inspiration, Modernism, researchComments (0)
In the theatrical tradition of Al Hirschfeld…
February 21, 2011
Al Hirschfeld was and remains an icon. It was a weekly joy to see who he would caricature in the Sunday New York Times. Since we read The Times online and no longer the print version I don’t think they have ever been able to replace him. Replace is the wrong word. Hirschfeld can never [...]
2011 | Art for Art's Sake | Tags: art, design, set design, TheatreComments (2)
A Valentine’s Day Sculpture from the buffet
February 17, 2011
So, we were out and about on Valentine’s Day. Things to do, people to meet. Presentations to be made. Lunch needed to grabbed by the roadside. Unfortunately, there were no cute and romantic little French bistro’s to be had in the wilds of New Jersey. We had to settle for an Asian-International buffet. I think [...]
2011 | Gastronauting | Tags: art, design, set designComments (1)
From The Art Director’s File: Cool Set Dressing
January 6, 2011
I’m always on the look out for set dressing that will, someday, speak to a character or scene. I have files full of all kinds of dressing – furniture, rugs, pillows, drapes, knick-knacks, books, statues, trophies, sports equipment, kitchen and dining, etc. As soon as I saw this clock, it went right into my file. [...]
